Volleyball: Freedom, LaMantia Clinch AAA Regional Bid in Milestone Season

Special to VivaLoudoun

South Riding (Oct. 30, 2011) - Just four volleyball seasons ago, Freedom High School had a varsity program that had won only one game. Kaitlyn LaMantia, then a freshman, learned a valuable lesson: it was clear that other teams were quicker and stronger.

Freedom started to click her sophomore season when the Eagles won 11 games. Everybody in the program was getting better and it showed. With 18 wins last season, Freedom earned the school's first ever regional and state volleyball appearances.

This year the Eagles goal is to surpass the 18-win mark and return to the state playoffs, even though they have been promoted to the larger-school AAA classification. LaMantia and the Eagles, with a 17-5 record, have already clinched a regional bid after capturing the school's first ever district volleyball title last week with wins over then-leader Broad Run and Stonewall Jackson.

If that milestone wasn't enough, LaMantia, the only 4-year varsity starter Freedom has had in the history of the program, has achieved a record that is a very uncommon milestone in volleyball for a player that plays setter half the time she is on the court and also plays outside hitter the other half of the time.

The milestone: LaMantia has achieved her 1,000 career assist Thursday night in the district-title clinching win against Stonewall Jackson.


LaMantia could not have achieved this goal alone. Last year, Freedom placed two girls into college volleyball programs for the first time in school history. Tori Kramer is playing at Waynesburg University in Pennsylvania and Jenna Flanigin is playing for Wingate University in North Carolina.

Additionally, Jasmine Jackson (currently a senior) will be playing for Francis Marion University in Florence, South Carolina. These girls are the players that had most of the kills from LaMantia's sets.

In June 2012, LaMantia will be attending North Carolina State University and will be playing volleyball for the Wolfpack. She will be the first NCAA Division I volleyball player the Freedom program has ever produced.